Gay, Roxane. Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body. New York: Harper Collins, 2017.
304 pages.
Reviewed by J. d'Artangnan Love
SYNOPSIS: Hunger is about Gay's experience with her fat body. Fat is used here not as an expletive but merely a descriptive word like "tall," and "short" are descriptive words. Gay explains her experience with food and fatness that, for her, stem from being raped as a child and not dealing with the trauma in a healthy way.
WHAT I LIKED: Roxane is incredibly brave to put herself out there in a memoir. It is clear that this book outlines the most vulnerable parts of herself. This is something not many people can do, and I certainly applaud her for this.
WHAT I DIDN'T LIKE: I wanted to love this book. As a fat, disabled feminist myself, I REALLY wanted to love this book....but I didn't. I found the style to be unorganized, almost like a series of blog posts mushed together to form a book. Some of the themes also felt forced rather than occurring organically. I also feel like, maybe, she wasn't ready to write the book as she reacts VERY sensitively to any criticism of the work. Please note, I'm not criticizing her experience so much as her writing which was repetitive, clunky, and unorganized.
RECOMMEND FOR: I could see this being a great read for people with no experience reading memoirs. It could also be beneficial for people who don't mind the blog-style of chapters rather than unified work.
NOT RECOMMENDED FOR: Honestly, if you want an honest, well-written look at living in a fat body, there are better memoirs out there.
3 starts out of 5
